


Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows

by cagethesongbird



Category: Mr. Robot (TV)
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Alternate Universe - Post-Canon, Carrying, Comfort, Established Relationship, Gen, M/M, Non-Sexual Age Play, Therapy, Thumb-sucking, also ive been seeing calls for better regression tags. yes we need them badly, not a lot of hurt. just elliot's doubt :(
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-03
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:21:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25681972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cagethesongbird/pseuds/cagethesongbird
Summary: Things should be blue skies for Elliot - after all, he did kinda sorta save the whole world.But he can't stop expecting the worst. And he's never stopped needing to be held.
Relationships: Elliot Alderson & Krista Gordon, Elliot Alderson & Tyrell Wellick, Elliot Alderson/Tyrell Wellick
Comments: 2
Kudos: 39





	Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows

**Author's Note:**

> This is a standalone, though it does make references to my other works :) 
> 
> enjoy <33

“What are you expecting, exactly?”

_That’s a good question. One I hadn’t considered. What does anybody want, really? Love? Acceptance? Money – but we already know how that ends, right?_

_Hello, friend. It’s been a while, I know. I’ve been busy. Things have changed – the pieces have moved places, and many players are off the board…_

“Elliot?” She draws out the syllables in his name. _Elle-ee-ought._

Krista’s soft, cloying drawl brings him back from the rabbit hole he nearly tumbles down. One they have discussed extensively: all the deaths, the trauma. The messy shit, they had it handled.

This was not that. This was a mess – Elliot’s head jumbled with _expectations._ Life after saving the world: _what the fuck do I do now?_

No E Corp, no Allsafe, no fsociety outside of wannabe offshoots. He had pulled off the largest, most destructive hack in human history, and now? Now he watched late night television at three in the afternoon and bothered Tyrell on his lunch break.

But it wasn’t exactly messy, not like everything else. It was a solid line of thinking, rather than a million strands of half-remembered memories. It was cut and dry, at least to Elliot. How do you deal? How does he continue to get up in the morning? 

“I’ve hurt so many people,” he murmurs, not meeting her eyes. Her heels are teal, which he finds to be suddenly fascinating. “Why should I get to be happy now?”

Krista sighs, half-heartedly rubs her temples. “How’s Tyrell?”

Elliot freezes; caught off guard by the sudden subject change. He narrows his eyes at her. “You’re going to say I should be happy because of him, ‘cause he would want me to be,” he accuses.

“Your happiness is dependent on no one but yourself, Elliot,” Krista says, voice and eyes matching kinds of soft.

He had raised his voice without realizing it, and he shrinks in on himself, guilty. He hadn’t meant to get loud. He takes a breath, like he’s supposed to. Holds it. Counts to five.

“I know, I mean –“

_I don’t know what I mean. Things should be good – great, even. But it’s like –_

 _"_ It’s like you’re waiting for the other shoe to drop,” Krista supplies. Elliot nods, mute.

_How does she_ do _that?_

Krista shakes her head, as if this boggles her mind. She scribbles something across her legal pad, daintily taps her toe against the floor, and waits patiently for him to start speaking again. Which of course, he doesn’t.

They stare at each other for a long moment. Krista knew him well enough to push, and he was stubborn enough to dig his heels into the silence.

“You didn’t answer my question, by the way.” She folds, as usual. They only had so much time together.

“Tyrell’s fine,” Elliot murmurs quietly, averting his eyes. Already embarrassed by where this line of questioning leads. “He’s good. They’re letting him see his baby, so he’s pretty happy about that.”

“That’s wonderful news. I’m sure he’s very happy,” Krista says, genuine. Elliot could tell she still had her doubts about previously disgraced former interim CTO Tyrell Wellick, but for Elliot’s sake, she didn’t voice them. “And you’re still…?”

_It was Tyrell who made me tell her. He offered to tell her himself, but it only would’ve made it that much worse – like a kid who goes through their mom for everything._

_He was right, and I knew he was right – this only works if I’m honest – but I still didn’t want to. I put it off. I lied about it, about when I told her. Besides having a somewhat unsavory reputation, it’s just plain embarrassing to admit to a thing like age regression._

_No one wants to admit not being able to care for themselves, or not wanting to. No one wants to admit vulnerability, under all of our fragile exteriors._

_But Krista – Krista is full of surprises. She had taken it in stride._

_“_ Common in dissociative disorders _,” she had said, kindly._ “And better for coping than morphine _.” And that had been that. The Krista seal of regression approval. But despite her taking it well, she had added it to her rounds of questioning._

_Which fucking blows._

“Playing,” Elliot replies, face warm. Not something he liked to say outside of the apartment. “Yeah, we are.”

“And it’s still helping you?”

_The question is innocent, just a review of information I’ve already told her, making sure we’re on the same page. But fuck, Jesus Christ, I don’t want to tell her that. I don’t want to tell her what she already knows, for both of us to hear it, real and aloud._

 _And she knows I don’t want that. That’s why she's pushing for it. She wants me to say, yes Krista, this highly-mortifying, intensely taboo thing I do helps_ a lot, _so that I have to accept that reality._

_Bullshit._

“Yeah,” he mutters.

Krista sighs, loud and exaggerated, and probably exasperated, if she wasn’t so good at masking it into a more neutral sound. “Are you going to talk to me, Elliot? Or are you going to put up walls all session?”

_Walls, please._

“I asked you what you were expecting. What _are_ you expecting, Elliot? What do you want, for the rest of it?”

The apartment is quiet when Elliot unlocks the door. Only the living room has a light on, casting the rest of the space in dreamy, soft shadows. Flipper barely pays him any mind, half-assedly raising her muzzle to him before rolling back into puppy dreamland. Not making much sound at all, let alone a ferocious bark.

“Some guard dog,” Elliot mumbles, but scratches her behind the ears anyway. She was no Doberman, but she was a good little ankle-biter.

He finds Tyrell asleep and fully clothed, not even his tie removed, atop the made bed. Elliot loiters in the doorway for a second, debating waking him or not, and not really noticing his thumb sneakily creeping towards his mouth.

Tyrell opens his eyes, and Elliot’s hand drops.

“Hey – oh, shit, hey! What time is it?” Tyrell sits up in a hurry. His perfectly-styled hair is half mussed. “I fell asleep. Why did I fall asleep?”

“It’s six thirty,” Elliot murmurs. “And I guess your interns attacked you, or something, ‘cause I’ve never seen you fall asleep with your tie still on.”

Tyrell snorts. “Yeah, maybe. Or maybe it was running into Phillip Price for the first time since Evil Corp’s liquidation.”

Elliot makes a face. That name had never sat particularly well with him. “He’s still around?”

“He never left. This is his world, really. When Evil Corp went down, they all got traded out like baseball cards. I did, too, but not to the same degree.” Tyrell sighs, looking suddenly weary.

Then he smiles, wry. “But how was Krista? You seem okay, right?”

_As opposed to all the times I’ve come home half-trapped in a panic attack._ “I’m okay. She asked about you.”

“Oh, yeah? What'd you tell her?” Tyrell rises from the bed, finally removes his tie and jacket, and gives Elliot a peck on the forehead. “Only good things, I hope?”

“All the bad stuff was already on the news,” Elliot points out.

“That’s true,” Tyrell says, grinning. “But what did you say? If you want to tell me.”

“That you get to see your baby,” Elliot murmurs. He drops his gaze, voice gone quiet. “That we still play.”

“We never stopped,” Tyrell says immediately, sounding confused. He stops puttering around the bedroom to really look at Elliot, who looks away. “Is something wrong with it?”

“No,” Elliot says quickly, without hesitation. His hand had come up towards his face, fingers dangerously close to his mouth.

Tyrell internally debates mentioning it, because one, gross. But two – it was pretty unconscious, and Elliot didn’t like to be reminded. It wasn’t worth the fight, in the middle of this seemingly important conversation.

“Not like that. It’s just – hard. To talk about. Don’t really… know how to articulate it, to her.” _I barely know how to tell him things, let alone turn around and explain them to a third party._

“Ah,” Tyrell says, understanding at last. “I imagine it would be that way. But it’s a good thing – God knows you deserve a repeat of childhood. Didn’t Krista even say it was a good thing?”

“Yeah,” Elliot says, sniffling. A few fat, token tears roll down his cheeks, the day’s struggle leaking out through his eyes.

Most of the time, Elliot hated being as skinny as he was. It put him at a disadvantage, outside of always being badgered to eat more. But when Tyrell offers to pick him up, he’s suddenly grateful and relieved to be as light as he is.

It’s a relief to be in his strong, solid arms. Elliot still lived his life afraid – his fear was constant and didn’t lighten up for very much – but like this, he feels safe. It’s a feeling he’s learned to hold tight to, when he found it.

“That’s alright,” Tyrell soothes. “We’re fine, my love. It might not be blue skies all the time, but we’ve survived thus far, hm?”

Elliot nods into his shoulder, thumb finally in his mouth, where he thinks Tyrell can’t see.

“Yes, we have. So I think we can handle the rest of it,” Tyrell says.

Then, as if by magic, he produces a pacifier. “Now get your fingers out of your mouth, _sötnos._ Yucky. Think of all the things you touched today.”


End file.
